The County Council’s General Purposes Committee today takes only an hour and a half to whip through its agenda, which catches the council officers presenting reports on the hop – they’ve obviously assumed we’ll take a lot longer and haven’t turned up for their slots yet, so colleagues are calling them to tell them they’re on and they’re racing in out of breath and skidding into the ‘report presenter’ chair.

The budget papers don’t get discussed at all: it’s a pretend budget (the Conservative administration will reveal its real budget next week, which it will propose as an amendment to the pretend budget we’re seeing today) so there’s no point having a pretend debate about it.

We are asked for money for staff to do financial assessments with adults receiving social care, after the Adults Committee recently agreed new and increased charges for many care recipients. We’re also asked to authorise spending on the council’s IT partly as a result of the move to Alconbury and also as part of the sharing of IT services between Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.

There’s also a proposal to spend money to try to reduce the number of Education Health & Care Plans (EHCPs) for children with special educational needs and disabilities. The assumption is that because there are more EHCPs being issued in affluent areas, this must mean that these children are receiving more council resources and support than they need. The proposal is to analyse the demand, identify ways to reduce it, and try them out. These will include using ‘behavioural science techniques’ to influence demand. I’m profoundly uneasy about some of these assumptions, and abstain on the vote.

A proposal for trialling car free zones outside a couple of schools only proposes to do so in Cambridge. I ask for consideration to be given to including a trial in a rural area as soon as possible.